About Roy McMakin

“The functional use of an art object is so interesting,” says Roy McMakin. “I figured out long ago that if, as an artist, you allow folks to use your works it changes everything. I think this is a deeply profound notion, and also kinda silly.” Much of McMakin’s work is premised on the re-imagination of the way in which functional objects are sited and situated, displaying a table on the wall or pillows on low pedestals. He experiments with the Duchampian readymade, transforming pre-existing cultural products into artworks by altering their context, presentation, or meaning. In his found and fabricated furniture pieces, McMakin also plays with the aesthetic conventions of sculpture, echoing, in the Bauhaus-like simplicity of his chairs, tables, and stools, minimalist painters and sculptors, such as Donald Judd and Anthony Caro.